We Are Not Alone

Posted on Wed Mar 21st, 2018 @ 9:41pm by Captain Mrazak & Lieutenant Isaiah Zelaney

1,046 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: S1E1: Bynars Be Bygones
Location: Administrator Office; Quarantined Hangar; Bynaus
Timeline: MD 6 20:30

Two hours had passed while Isaiah worked fervently at the Bynar computer input console. The controls were a bit difficult to manage at first, with only buttons for a 0 and a 1 on the interface, but it didn't take long for Isaiah to pick up on the binary language and was soon moving through the system with ease. Had anyone been paying close attention, they would have noticed him attach a small, diamond shaped device to the side of the console. Luckily for him, he was basically alone in the room.

Time passed and information was sifted through, until finally, something caught the man's attention.

Isaiah leaned forward, looking at the block of zeroes and ones on the screen. "Zelaney to Mrazak," he said, after tapping his combadge. "Can you join me in here, please?"

Mrazak's reply was terse though excited.

=/\="On my way."=/\=

In a moment's time, Mrazak burst through the door to the empty administrator's office. "Report. What have you found?"

"Not one hundred percent positive, just yet," he said, his voice sounding absent-minded and distant. "I think there's someone else in the system with me, though."

Mrazak raised an eyebrow. "The entire planet is in the system, Lieutenant. Impress me further."

"No, not exactly." Isaiah, pressed the two controls a few times each before he pointed to a single line of text. "This is one of the Bynars in the mainframe. Small, intricate, delicate and specific. Now this..." This time, the controls were tapped quite a few more times. "This here is me," he said pointing to a larger block of text. "I'm very smart when it comes to computer language so it didn't take me long to learn how to navigate."

One single control tap on the zero key caused a much larger block of text to fill the screen. "This is someone who has no idea what they're doing. They're leaving a footprint so large, it was hard not to notice. But you'd only notice if you knew what to look for, so they aren't quite stupid when it comes to computers themselves. Just not the binary language."

Isaiah looked up at Mrazak, "Sir, there's someone else here in the system with me."

Mrazak's eyes narrowed. "Can you trace them? We need to know if it's local or remote."

"Seems to be remote," Isaiah said, peering deeply into the large block of ones and zeroes. "But I think they're on the planet."

"Trace it. If you're dealing with an inferior hacker, then find him." Mrazak took a seat and closed his eyes. Soon he began breathing deeply, in and out.

Isaiah sat there for a few moments in silence as he input command after command into the system, obviously becoming more and more frustrated. "No, he's definitely not inferior..." he said, almost to himself.

Mrazak gave a deep sigh of relief. "All right," he said as if to himself. "I'm ready."

He reached into his small carrying case and removed an elastic headband with electrodes positioned like sequins. It snapped with a mild arc when he tapped the two end pieces together.

"I've never used this before, but I can't say that I haven't thought about it." Mrazak noted the registry number for Isaiah's console and then paired the headband with it.

"Are you sure that's such a good idea?" Isaiah asked, looking at the device longingly. He reached out to touch the device, but the Vulcan was to quick.

As he slid the headband over his eyes and temples, Mrazak said, "What is that song of your people? 'Live once and prosper'?"

Disorientation overwhelmed Mrazak's sensory synapses. His mind was simultaneously filled with darkness and brilliant colors interspersed with shrieking silence and tingling numbness of his extremities. Soon, though, coherence came to him after a fashion. It was not unlike a dream state where he was aware of those around him. At first he took a few steps around the office, gaining traction in the system.

"Incredible..." Mrazak was nearly breathless with wonder. "Oh, Lieutenant Zany, the Praxis is brilliant. You should see it!"

Isaiah's infrared silhouette stood out from the muted shapes of the drab office. The console, however, shone like the sun. Multiple streams of data rose up into the air like a rainbow and split off into different directions. As he concentrated, Mrazak could intuit the purpose and destination for each section of the bandwidth. Who could ever have thought binary code could be so beautifully expressed?

"Which one--" Mrazak cut himself off. Merely thinking the question isolated the answer in his perspective. Shockingly, Mrazak found his perspective moving even while his body stood still. "I'm tracing it now." The doors parted, pulling his mind's eye down the corridor at the speed of transmission. "Truly, Lieutenant Zany, I--"

Steel doors slammed shut before his mind, then melded together in a seamless form. When he pressed forward, a burning sensation touched him.

Mrazak grunted in pain. "Was... is that a firewall?" His mind recoiled back to the office where his body stood.

No. He had seated himself. Then who was holding the phaser...

"Disengage!" Mrazak screamed. He ripped the headband off his head and flung it to the ground. "Bath'paik! Who was that?" he asked, looking around for an aggressor who was not actually there. Well, at least not in body.

Isaiah moved from his seat, picking up the device with care, making sure it wasn't damaged from the impact. "I'm not sure, Commander. But whoever it is, they have experience in what they're doing." Taking the device, Isaiah gently slid it back into it's case, placing his hand firmly on the metallic carrier.

"And they know we're here," Mrazak said. "Stay here and finish what you're doing. Colonel Garlic and I will secure the android. I'm sending our other Marine on a hunting trip. Report any other breaches or sightings to myself."

With a nod, Isaiah watched as Mrazak left the room. Once he was, again, alone, he pulled the metallic case and opened it. A mischievous smile spread over his face as he pulled the device from it's snug casing, his fingers gingerly touching the nodes on the side. Sliding the contraption on his head, Isaiah closed his eyes and melted seamlessly into the Praxis.

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